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Patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, drug treatment history and characteristics of addicts in methadone maintenance treatment in Iran

BACKGROUND: Opiates are the main drugs of abuse, and Methadone Maintenance Treatment (MMT) is the most widely administered drug addiction treatment program in Iran. Our study aimed to investigate patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, addiction treatment history and characteristics of patients in MMT...

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Autores principales: Shekarchizadeh, Hajar, Ekhtiari, Hamed, Khami, Mohammad R, Virtanen, Jorma I
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2012
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3405442/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22676557
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1477-7517-9-18
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author Shekarchizadeh, Hajar
Ekhtiari, Hamed
Khami, Mohammad R
Virtanen, Jorma I
author_facet Shekarchizadeh, Hajar
Ekhtiari, Hamed
Khami, Mohammad R
Virtanen, Jorma I
author_sort Shekarchizadeh, Hajar
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Opiates are the main drugs of abuse, and Methadone Maintenance Treatment (MMT) is the most widely administered drug addiction treatment program in Iran. Our study aimed to investigate patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, addiction treatment history and characteristics of patients in MMT in Tehran. METHODS: We applied a stratified cluster random sampling technique and conducted a cross-sectional survey utilizing a standard patient characteristic and addiction history form with patients (n = 810) in MMT. The Chi-square test and t-test served for statistical analyses. RESULTS: A clear majority of the participants were men (96%), more than 60% of whom were between 25 and 44 years of age, educated (89% had more than elementary education), and employed (>70%). The most commonly reported main drugs of abuse prior to MMT entry were opium (69%) and crystalline heroin (24%). The patients’ lifetime drug experience included opium (92%), crystalline heroin (28%), cannabis (16%), amphetamines (15%), and other drugs (33%). Crystalline heroin abusers were younger than opium users, had begun abusing drugs earlier, and reported a shorter history of opiate addiction. CONCLUSION: Opium and crystalline heroin were the main drugs of abuse. A high rate of addiction using more dangerous opiate drugs such as crystalline heroin calls for more preventive efforts, especially among young men.
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spelling pubmed-34054422012-07-27 Patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, drug treatment history and characteristics of addicts in methadone maintenance treatment in Iran Shekarchizadeh, Hajar Ekhtiari, Hamed Khami, Mohammad R Virtanen, Jorma I Harm Reduct J Research BACKGROUND: Opiates are the main drugs of abuse, and Methadone Maintenance Treatment (MMT) is the most widely administered drug addiction treatment program in Iran. Our study aimed to investigate patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, addiction treatment history and characteristics of patients in MMT in Tehran. METHODS: We applied a stratified cluster random sampling technique and conducted a cross-sectional survey utilizing a standard patient characteristic and addiction history form with patients (n = 810) in MMT. The Chi-square test and t-test served for statistical analyses. RESULTS: A clear majority of the participants were men (96%), more than 60% of whom were between 25 and 44 years of age, educated (89% had more than elementary education), and employed (>70%). The most commonly reported main drugs of abuse prior to MMT entry were opium (69%) and crystalline heroin (24%). The patients’ lifetime drug experience included opium (92%), crystalline heroin (28%), cannabis (16%), amphetamines (15%), and other drugs (33%). Crystalline heroin abusers were younger than opium users, had begun abusing drugs earlier, and reported a shorter history of opiate addiction. CONCLUSION: Opium and crystalline heroin were the main drugs of abuse. A high rate of addiction using more dangerous opiate drugs such as crystalline heroin calls for more preventive efforts, especially among young men. BioMed Central 2012-06-07 /pmc/articles/PMC3405442/ /pubmed/22676557 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1477-7517-9-18 Text en Copyright ©2012 Shekarchizadeh et al.;licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research
Shekarchizadeh, Hajar
Ekhtiari, Hamed
Khami, Mohammad R
Virtanen, Jorma I
Patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, drug treatment history and characteristics of addicts in methadone maintenance treatment in Iran
title Patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, drug treatment history and characteristics of addicts in methadone maintenance treatment in Iran
title_full Patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, drug treatment history and characteristics of addicts in methadone maintenance treatment in Iran
title_fullStr Patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, drug treatment history and characteristics of addicts in methadone maintenance treatment in Iran
title_full_unstemmed Patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, drug treatment history and characteristics of addicts in methadone maintenance treatment in Iran
title_short Patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, drug treatment history and characteristics of addicts in methadone maintenance treatment in Iran
title_sort patterns of pre-treatment drug abuse, drug treatment history and characteristics of addicts in methadone maintenance treatment in iran
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3405442/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22676557
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1477-7517-9-18
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